I presented on behalf of Sydney Inthof, a Research Learning Experience (CHEM 445) student working on conducting validity and reliability studies of an acid-base concept test. The test was first developed by directed studies student Jessie Zhang in 2016-2017 (supervised by Jane Maxwell and me). The concept test measures students’ abilities to rationalize the strength of acids and bases qualitatively. This is an important reasoning skill commonly taught in second-year organic chemistry courses.
Like all concept tests, it has the potential to be used for assessing changes to curriculum and pedagogy in university chemistry courses. This year, Sydney is focussing on gathering content validity evidence from chemistry experts within and outside of UBC.
My presentation provided the group with an overview of educational measurement concepts, including reliability and validity. We discussed the draft expert online survey which we are refining to ensure experts can easily review the content in all three tiers of the test items. Presenting the content visually is a challenge for multi-tiered concept tests.
Yanru (Jessie) Zhang presented this work at the 2017 Canadian Chemistry Conference and was awarded the 2nd-place student oral presentation award. Congratulations!
